I have 3 step Celtic plan to remove Green Brigade as this is wanton delinquency not political activism – Hugh Keevins

When Brendan Rodgers rescued a schoolchild from the clutches of an overzealous steward at Livingston after Celtic’s win there last month, he received an ovation from the travelling fans.

The manager explained he had taken personal responsibility for the child’s safety and returned the boy to his guardians because he was a Celtic supporter as a child in Northern Ireland and instinctively understood the reason for the youngster’s field invasion.

The kid had been thrilled by the game and, in a fit of youthful exuberance, had wanted to be up close to his heroes. The problem is that, in some cases, the innocence of youth gives way to cynicism the older some people become. I felt nothing but sympathy for Rodgers in the hours before Celtic’s Champions League tie with Atletico Madrid on Wednesday.

He voiced his belief his name had been “erased” from Celtic’s history by those one-time innocents enraged by his decision to leave the club and join Leicester City in 2019. When Gordon Strachan was Celtic’s manager he would frequently say that criticism was not a problem at all so far as he was concerned.

It was the quality of the criticism that concerned him. In other words, how hard you listen depends on who is doing the shouting at you. I wrote here last week that Celtic’s decision to exclude the Green Brigade from away matches was tantamount to the outbreak of internal warfare at the club.

So it turned out to be on Wednesday when the club’s request for flags not to be flown as a form of political protest was visibly ignored. The following words were spoken by the former Celtic manager Ange Postecoglou before his Spurs team played Fulham last Monday.

Spurs traditionally draw a large percentage of their support from London’s